Open Letter for Europe: We Must Stop the EU Blame Game

We the undersigned, members of national parliaments across the EU, would like to highlight a few of the achievements the EU has contributed to our lives:

The EU has made us greener, healthier, wealthier and fairer;

The EU has allowed more than 50 years of peace on the European continent;

The EU has allowed the free movement of people around Europe and has facilitated travelling;

The EU Erasmus exchange programme has helped improve education opportunities, allowing the European youth to experience other EU realities and facilitating fruitful ties.

Europe in crisis

The Euro crisis has damaged the EU's capacity to deliver prosperity to its citizens, exacerbating tensions across Member States; whilst the refugee crisis is putting at risk the values on which the EU was founded, the future of free movement across the EU and the Union’s ability to secure its borders.

The accumulation of crises at the EU level is both cause and effect of a deeper malaise among European citizens leading to a profound legitimacy crisis of the EU project. Disaffection towards the EU’s institutions and proceedings is unprecedented. Yet, the destiny of European states and its citizens has never been as interconnected as today.

A call to action: stop the EU blame game

A toxic narrative presently exists in the European political debate and is widespread among policy makers throughout the EU and at all levels of political decision making. This narrative sees political actors consistently blame “Brussels” and each other across Member State lines, rather than addressing European problems in their own merit, and in doing so, attempting to find shared solutions to our common problems.

We the undersigned, Members of National Parliaments across the EU, recognise the need to reset the European debate in order to engage in an unbiased and pragmatic conversation about the European project, its goals, what it can and cannot achieve, in the name of both collective and national interests, in the spirit of necessary compromise and mutually-beneficial solidarity.

To:

Reconnect citizens with the EU, restore EU legitimacy and better address citizens’ needs and expectations of the EU;

Aim to develop a more robust and fair European economy, capable of competing with other world powers;